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Tuesday, November 13, 2007

Doing good is good no matter the motivations

So Beth and I are trying to read the Bible regularly--something we NEED to do.

We started reading Philippians today, and we found some interesting verses:

Philippians 1:15-18"It is true that some preach Christ out of envy and rivalry, but others out of goodwil. The latter do so in love, knowing that I am put here for the defense of the gospel. The former preach Christ out of selfish ambition, not sincerely, supposing that they can stir up trouble for me while I am in chains. But what does it matter? The important thing is that in every way, whether from false motives or true, Christ is preached. And because of this I rejoice."

I thought this was especially interesting. There was a discussion a few months ago in our Sunday School class, and a lot of the general thought was that any good done with selfish motivations was not good at all, but bad, and a detriment in fact. Beth and I disagreed with this sentiment. I mean, isn't all good done with a somewhat selfish motivation. And even if someone does good with COMPLETE selfish motivation, the good that he did, whether helping build a house, or donating money to something, is still good that's done. Warren Buffet could have donated that 35 billion because he wanted to make himself look good, but that's his own problem. The 35 billion is still going to go to do good.